Basic playing methods of harmonica
The polyphonic harmonica is a reed instrument, which produces sound by blowing and sucking. Its musical scale arrangement is different from other musical instruments. Take an ordinary polyphonic 24-hole harmonica as an example. It is divided into bass, alto, treble, 1, 3,5 blowing, 2,4,6,7 sucking.
The basic grip of the harmonica is that the thumb of the left hand presses the left end (bass) of the harmonica, and the other four fingers naturally bend and lightly press on the upper cover of the harmonica. The thumb of the right hand is required to be flexible. When playing high notes, your thumb should be moved away slightly so as not to interfere with the performance. When playing high or low notes, the harmonica should move left and right by wrist movements. When playing, the head should be straight and the chest should be straight naturally, which is convenient for breathing and stretching.
1. Monotone playing method
Single-tone playing, also called single-hole playing, is the first step to get familiar with the harmonica scale. The way to play is to narrow your mouth and aim at a sound hole on the harmonica to form a slightly smaller circle. Starting from the middle of the harmonica "1", blow out the airflow according to the sounds of 1, 3 and 5 in turn, and suck in the airflow according to the sounds of 2, 4, 6 and 7, and blow.
2. Compound single-tone playing method
The compound monophonic playing method is also called the new monophonic playing method. When you basically master the "single-tone playing method", you can switch to the "compound single-tone playing method", that is, hold the harmonica with the correct mouth shape to achieve the correct pronunciation effect. The method is to open your mouth naturally, hold the seven holes of the harmonica, cover the six holes under the left tonic with your tongue, and blow or suck out a single note from the right lip. However, it should be noted that the tongue should always be on the left, and the tongue should not leave the piano when playing.
3. Polyphony accompaniment
This method is a basic method to further master various playing methods, and it is also a playing method with bass accompaniment. On the basis of the compound monophonic playing method, as long as the tip of the tongue moves away from or continues to cover the lattice according to the accompaniment symbols and beat requirements indicated in the harmonica music, the harmonica will make a soft accompaniment sound of "sonorous" through the reciprocating action of covering and leaving the sound hole of the harmonica with the tip of the tongue, and through the airflow activity of blowing and sucking, which is the acoustic effect of the operation of "polyphonic accompaniment". Cover the tip of the tongue and be careful not to interrupt the airflow.
Breathing method of harmonica
Thoracoabdominal breathing
This is the main breathing method for playing the harmonica. Simply put, the diaphragm sinks when inhaling, the abdomen rises, and the opposite is true when blowing. But if you take a deep breath, your chest will expand and contract. Breathing through the nose while playing helps to control the amount of breathing.
Cyclic breathing method
This is a seemingly mysterious technology. Because of this breathing, players can inhale through their mouths and exhale through their noses at the same time, or inhale through their mouths and noses! It seems that players don't need to breathe. Isn't it amazing?
I don't know whether this method can be actually applied to harmonica, but it is worth your reference! Its main principle is to use the oral cavity as the slow filling area of breathing, and push or suck air (stored in the oral cavity) through the action of the tongue and jaw. Because the air pushed out or sucked in is only temporarily stored in the mouth and does not affect the respiratory tract, you can also make the opposite breathing action with your nose.
Practice method
Push air-when the normal chest and abdomen blowing goes to the end, keep a breath in your mouth, stop the normal blowing, and immediately push the air out of your mouth with your tongue.
Exhaustion-when the normal chest and abdomen inhalation reaches the tail end, stop inhaling, immediately inhale through the tongue and jaw and store it in the mouth.
How to play the decorative sound of harmonica?
Because of the particularity of harmonica, in some teaching materials, it is advocated to blow the vibrato of 5 into 5151~ ~, and the vibrato of 2 into 24242424~~, and many harmonica players seriously abide by the rules of 56565656~~ and 23232323 ~. Chromatic harmonica has a slight advantage in vibrato performance because of his keys, but he is not omnipotent. The advantage of polyphonic harmonica is that it can be played with another instrument. For example, if you want to play 5656565666, you can play it with a piano that is lower than the original key, 6666666666 or transpose it, so that 23232323~~ becomes 67676767~~ and other vibrato can be solved in the same way.
10 Kong Qin can be used in the same way as polyphonic Qin. Some musicians use gargle-like movements to make the air flow not pass through the throat and achieve rapid vibrato. This technique can be heard in many solos. Of course, it does not rule out that some musicians have very strong control over abdominal muscles and play vibrato directly.
In short, vibrato performance is not a very simple problem for any kind of harmonica. Don't expect the effects that can be achieved by instruments that rely on fingers to complete vibrato like flute and piano.